Still trying to figure it out (08/14/06)

Why is it that a child will be cranky with one person and not with another? I'm not sure anybody knows for sure. I remember when my daughter was little. Everybody told me what a good child she was. She was helpful and a delight to be with.

My response was always, "Little brown-haired girl, about this high?"

They would respond in the affirmative and go on to extol her virtues while I listened in disbelief and asked them, "Are you sure?"

Now my seven-month-old granddaughter, Emma, is carrying on the tradition only in reverse. She is a delight with her mother but apparently a never-ending crying machine while mama is at work. Somehow this is supposed to be my daughter's fault. I'm still trying to figure that one out.

Crying is often a baby's most effective means of communication. Screaming is a way to get what they want quickly and apparently in Emma's case it works like a charm. When she cries long and loud enough someone picks her up and walks around with her.

For the record, Emma was the happiest baby I've ever seen while she and her mother were here a couple of weeks ago. I gave the baby a set of measuring spoons and let her explore the kitchen while I did the dishes. She was perfectly content while mama enjoyed the rare treat of being able to bathe by herself for as long as she wanted. Therefore I am mystified by the reports that all this child does is cry and demand to be held when her mama is not around.

We have lots of pictures of her on the floor and not in someone's arms as proof that we didn't pick her up every two seconds. She is smiling in almost every picture. If she isn't smiling it is because she is stuffing something in her mouth, which seems to be her favorite activity.

I have always enjoyed having children of any age in the house. When my daughter was little we had the house that every mother went to when she couldn't find her toddler. It wasn't because we had the best toys around because we didn't. I think it was because every kid knew exactly what was expected. There was to be no fighting, biting or other bad behavior and the toys had to be picked up before the child was allowed to leave. Once I had two little boys scrubbing down the newly-painted walls because they had scuffed them by spinning around on the rocking chair. They came back the next day and many days after that. The wall was never scuffed again. They had learned to pull the chair out from the wall if they wanted to twirl on it and everybody was happy.

Children all need to know where they stand and what is expected of them. If they can stand at all then they are big enough to pick up after themselves albeit with plenty of help. It does them no favors to do everything for them.

I really wish I could live close enough to baby-sit Emma on a regular basis. I don't know if she would cry for hours at a time with me or if she would quickly realize that I have no intention of carrying her around all day. Babies are meant to be held and cuddled on a regular basis but they also need to explore their surroundings. They need tables to crawl under and animals to play with. We should eliminate as many potential hazards as possible while letting them find out for themselves that things don't always go their way.

I can offer no advice that will be guaranteed to stop this cycle of heart-rending screaming. The only way I know to end the howling is not to give in to it. Pick her up and make sure that she wants nothing other than to be held and distract her with something to chew on, then put her down.

The crying will end one day only to be replaced by a shouted, "NO!" when told to do anything. That will in turn be replaced by incessant whining and eventually by the surliness of the teen years.

All I can say is, "Babies don't cry forever, it only seems that way."[[In-content Ad]]